So picture this: a company wants to hirefor a job that requires html, css,javascript, and pythonand two developers come and apply forthis job.One developer has a cs degree and theyknow c++, and the other developer isself-taught, or maybe even went to abootcamp, but on their resume they saythat they know html, css, javascript, andpython.So who has the advantage here?Believe it or not the person with thedegree actually has the advantage hereeven though they don't know thelanguages that are required by the job.But why? And how can we overcome thisadvantage?So some of you guys might not know this,but when I apply for a job I actuallydon't have a portfolio, I don't have apersonal website, and I don't have agithub profile. So why do I recommend youguys to have these things when I don'teven have these things? And the reason is:the most important thing when it comesto hiring a software developer is trust.The company needs to trust two things.Number one that you're good enough forthe job, and number two that you're anice person to work with.So number two usually comes out duringthe interview, but number one being goodenough for the job, is what gets you theinterview in the first place. So thereason why I don't have a portfolio, or apersonal website, or github, is because Ihave work experience that workexperience is enough to build trust witha company. When they see my workexperience, they think hey this guy'sworked somewhere similar, he's donesimilar projects, so he's probably goodenough for our job. So that's mostly whatyou're trying to do, you're trying tobuild trust with the company, you'retrying to make them believe that you'regood enough. That's why when someoneinside the company refers you, it's a loteasier to get the interview, because theperson who's hiringknows the person who refers you, and theytrust their opinion. So if you don't havework experience, that's why we recommendyou to build a portfolio and to have agithub profile. This is how you buildtrust with a company, they're able to seewhat you're capable of making, andthey're able to see the quality of yourcode. So let's go back to the example wewere talking about in the beginning. Wehave one person who has a cs degree, andthey know c++ and we have anotherperson who is self-taught, or went to abootcamp and they know html, css,javascript, and python. So what do we knowabout the person who has a cs degree?Well we know that they went through fouryears of college, so they went throughfour years of doing a bunch ofassignments and tests, so they'reprobably very dedicated. What else do weknow? Well they can put down the classesthat they took in their degree. Theyprobably took programming 101, datastructures and algorithms, objectoriented programming, all of thosecourses are actually really importantwhen it comes to being a softwareengineer. So that's why having a degreealready builds a lot of trust. We knowthat you're able to dowork, or you're able to do assignmentsthat the company will give you. We knowthat you have a fundamentalunderstanding of computer science. Now ifwe switch over to the person who isself-taught or who went to a boot camp,what do we know about this person? Whenit comes to a boot camp we do know thatthey went through the boot camp, theyprobably learned these technologies thatwe're looking for, and they probablyworked on some team projects in the bootcamp. So that's a plus for themthat builds trust with the company, butfor the self-taught person we don'treally know anything about you. It'sreally easy to put html, css, andjavascript, on your resume withoutactually being good at those languages.In order to build trust, you have tobuild a portfolio, and not only that yourportfolio has to communicate to thecompany why you're a great developer.Having a portfolio is not a guaranteefor getting job interviews. So let's saythat you build something like a facebookclone or a netflix clone, and then you putthat on your resume. Well the companydoesn't actually know what that projectlooks like they don't know if it's justa simple html, css, and javascript pagethat was made to look like thosewebsites, or if it's a full-fledged webapplication that you built. They don'tknow how complex it is, so this is notdoing a good job of building that trustwith the company. Remember the wholepoint of having a portfolio is to makethe company trust that you're a gooddeveloper so you want to make sure thatyou have demos of your project. Thecompany needs to be able to use yourproject, or at least have a video ofyourself using your project, so that theycan actually see what you did. They havea clear idea of what you created.And if possible you can put your code ongithub so that they can get a clear ideaof your code quality. Doing those thingswill build more trust than simply justhaving a portfolio and having a bunch ofprojects. It's also really important tobuild trust as fast as you can, so when acompany looks at your portfolio theyneed to know quickly whether you're agood developer or not. The longer ittakes for them to review your resume andyour portfolio and figure out whetheryou're good enough, the less chance youhave of getting an interview. That'sbecause it's very expensive for acompany to get someone to look throughapplications and figure out who theywant to hire, so they only spend a fewseconds on your resume looking to see ifthere's anything interesting. That'swhy in addition to having great projects,you also want to present yourself reallywell, and I guess really efficiently inyour portfolio. You want to have demos,video recordings, nice designs, anythingthat makes the recruiter's job easier,makes it faster for them to see ifyou're a match for the job. And that ishow self-taught developers can get theadvantage back from people who have adegree. Of course the people who have adegree can also come with their ownportfolio, or even with internshipexperience, but remember that there's nolimit to how good you can make yourportfolio. If you build a web app, forexample, that lets your local restaurantstake online orders without payingubereats fees, and a bunch of localrestaurants sign up for that, I wouldactually hire someone like this oversomeone who has a degree and aninternship experience, because this kindof experience is really hard to find andit's really good in communicating whyyou're a great developer and even agreat entrepreneur. So that's my adviceto you, at the end of the day it doesn'treally matter whether you have a csdegree, or if you're self-taught, the mostimportant thing, remember this, is tobuild trust with the company. You have toshow them as fast as you can how goodyou are, whether you have work experience,that's a really fast way of showing them,or you built a portfolio and you have abunch of demos, and videos, and images.Thank you so much for watching my nameis Simon from supersimple.dev I want tomake a tech career possible for anyone. Ifyou have any questions or commentsplease leave them down below, and I'llsee you in the next one.
